


Because

by Dubiousculturalartifact (222Ravens)



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Autistic Character, Autistic!Ray Palmer, M/M, Sara & Leonard friendship feels, Sara Lance POV, Sara is one hundred percent done, Sara/All The Ladies, Sea Shanties, Semi-Crack, Waffles, all that good stuff, fuzzy bunny slippers, irresponsible alcohol consumption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-09-03 12:25:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8713861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/222Ravens/pseuds/Dubiousculturalartifact
Summary: Sara just wants to eat waffles, and punch things, and kiss girls. This should not be her life. Or: the one where Sara manages to get Leonard Snart just drunk enough that he actually talks about his feelings.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Set at a nebulously near-future point in the Legends' timeline, completely with a blatantly hand-waved resurrection for Leonard Snart. 
> 
> This was supposed to be a ficlet. And then it became 5,000+ words of ridiculous, because I have zero self-control.
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> (Thanks for beta-ing, areyouarealmonster. This is all your fault, anyway.)

“Feeling more like yourself, now? I’m assuming so, since you just snuck out of the med-bay to grab a drink.”

 

Snart looks up at her, an empty shot-glass of something in his hand, only half-way expressionless. “Hard to say, really. My memories are back. But I did _die_. I think that alone is guaranteed to do a number on my sense of self.” He holds up his other hand to the light. Twists his fingers around, cautiously, as if reassuring himself of his own physical permanence.

 

So Sara shrugs, walking into the room. “Yeah, well. Been there, done that.”

 

“Still. Maybe dying's good for the soul." It's a joke, hiding truth.

 

“My soul's been through worse." Sara says, and it’s not a joke. Not really.

 

After a moment of weighing her options, she sits down across from him at the table. Sara looks down, biding her time.

 

He speaks, breaking the heavy silence. “I meant to say earlier. Jax mentioned. Your sister. I…”

 

The hurt, even this many months past, is still fresh enough to distract her. "Thanks," she says, hollowly. There’s a bottle beside Snart. She sniffs it, shrugs, and pours a matching shot.

 

She’d been planning on get ‘ _I have too many responsibilities and thorny inner pain for someone who really just wants to drink bad alcohol, punch things,_ _and kiss girls’_ kind of drunk in peaceful solitude, anyway, so she supposes this works, too.

 

Not the best coping strategy, but it’ll do.

 

“Shit. _Lisa._ Does she know about me…you know. Dying and all? Tell me someone told her. Tell me she doesn’t think I just disappeared.” There’s a desperate edge to the way Snart asks, one that Sara hates.

 

She hates that it’s there, and she hates how little she had thought to worry about that. How she’d been so wrapped up in her own grief, over her own sister, that Snart’s had escaped her mind. She’d never formally met Lisa, but she still knows that Snart cares a lot about his sister, and she knows that Lisa probably had deserved better.

 

“Mick told her when we got back to 2016, I think. I’m not sure how she took it. But you know, we could fix that. You could visit, or send a letter through time…”

 

“Arriving a day or two before Mick visits, as a warning? So she only _acts_ freaked out, but the timeline stays intact, but…she knows. She knows that I’m okay,” he says, letting out a breath, and there’s something a little lighter to him.

 

 _“Are_ you okay?”

 

“I will be. Maybe.”

 

“Good. Then I’ll check with Gideon, first thing. I’m sure you’ll want to see her. I’d like to make that happen, if it won’t mess with the timeline too much. Because, yeah, in case you missed the memo…this is my life now, apparently. Balancing time itself on the edge of a knife, while trying not to cut ourselves. Yours too, unless…”

 

“ _Unless?”_

Perhaps overly casual, she adds, “That’s assuming you want to rejoin the team. I don’t want to make assumptions.”

 

The question hangs in the air, as Snart shifts his neck, considering it. “Hm. Rejoining the team. How'll that work?"

 

"Same as before, mostly, minus the specificity of the mission. We hunt a lot of different problems, now. Keep the timeline from going too haywire, now it’s not being controlled by anyone else.”

 

A shrug. Overly casual on his end, too. ”I guess I could join back up. Haven’t got a lot else planned.”

 

The shot is still in her hand. Some sort of awful grain alcohol, by the smell. But it’s cold, and it’s there, and Snart is probably two drinks ahead of her, by now.

 

She downs the shot, finally. ”Speaking of assumptions, by the way? We should probably. Talk. About…”

 

Snart winces, and puts his own shot glass down. ”Right. The kiss. Thing. _That_ happened."

 

“Yeah. If you’re rejoining the team? I'd like it if we were on the same page."

 

"Listen. I don’t want to…” He starts.

 

" _I pretty much just did it because you were dying for us?"_ She blurts out, at the same time.

 

Rather than disappointment, his face sags, relieved. "Oh, thank _God_.”

 

He has the grace to look embarrassed, at least. And Sara can’t say she doesn’t entirely share the sentiment. Still, she has certain self-respect, so, ”That's not the most flattering response I've ever gotten to turning someone down, but under the circumstances, I'll take it."

 

Snart’s response is to groan, stretching himself like an uncomfortable cat. ”Look. It was _stupid_ , alright? It just…once we found out about the Time Masters, what their _real_ plan was, it kept bothering me. The idea that the time bastards could be messing with our lives, like that. That our choices weren’t our own. I was trying to fight fate, to go against instincts of what I actually wanted, because I was pretty sure I couldn’t trust myself to know what that even _was._ ”

 

Sara squints at him, trying to parse the logic, and he keeps rambling.

 

“I like you, Sara, don’t get me wrong. We work well together. Hell, I _trust_ you _._ I just _really_ don’t see you like that. I tried telling myself different. Making a move, to see if that could shift the probabilities. To see if I could imagine a different future, one with us in it, and see if that changed anything else about the one that was going to happen. One big heterosexual butterfly effect.”

 

"That's the stupidest plan I ever heard."

 

“I think that’s a teensy bit harsh.” Leonard argues, but it’s without much energy.

 

She pours another shot because, what the hell. “Actually, you’re right. It’s not even the stupidest plan you had that day. That honor goes to the part when you….”

 

“Better plan. We don’t talk about _that_ , either. Enough dying chat for one day.”

 

“Fine by me. _For now_ , at least _._ ” She raises the glass. “Friends?"

 

"Friends." He says, drawling, with almost a smile. “Sure.”

 

They clink shot-glasses, and drink. After about ten minutes more of companionable silence, Sara swirls the stray drops of liquid at the bottom of her little glass. Watching the patterns of light refract, and thinking about a refill. ”I did miss you, though. We all did."

 

He looks sidelong at her, oddly cautious. ” _All_ of you?"

 

She thinks for a minute. “Let’s see. Stein called you a ' _presence he almost missed_ ', which is pretty high praise, from him. Jax at one point, totally out of the blue, said ‘ _you know, Snart wasn't totally awful_. _He was like… an occasionally homicidal older brother_.’ Again. High praise. Rip mentioned you were _‘a half-way decent member of the team, actually, and deserved better than to die for my mistakes_.’

 

Snart’s smile is jagged. “Is that all?”

_“_ Mostly. _Oh!”_ She says, almost laughing, for some reason. “Even _Palmer_ got really drunk on this godawful retsina in a really crappy ancient Greek taverna, and cried at Mick about how he was never gonna be as cool as you were. Mick, of course, threatened to set him on fire. But actually, _didn’t_ , so, you know. So all in all, I think it counted as a beautiful moment.”

 

And she knows it’s black humor what she’s talking about, but it’s not like anybody else is going to get the weirdness of coming back from the dead.

 

Finding out how people mourned you. The ways your absence left something tangible behind, and the ways it didn’t matter at all, in the end. How to cope with that.

 

Something in his face flickers, at the last. "How _nice_. Can we stop talking about people’s feelings, yet?"

 

Sara shrugs, and doesn’t push the subject. So they stop, and Sara sits and thinks about what she needs to think about. Because she might be playing ‘moral support’ right now, but, believe it or not? She has her own life. A life that’s pretty complicated, honestly, all on its own.

 

Neither of them speaks, for a little while, and it’s weirdly…nice. Being around someone that she can be silent with. Especially now they’ve cleared the air, on where they stand with each other. Snart is a bastard, sure. But he’s also pretty damn alright, as men go.

 

“Still got those cards?” Snart asks.

 

She pulls them out of her pocket, and then stops, a stray thought coming to mind. So she flourishes the cards, a gleam in her eye. “After you answer _one_ more question."

 

With a face that says he’ll regret it, he agrees. "Fine."

 

"You said hitting on _me_ was against your instincts. Does that mean your instincts were to go after someone else, instead?"

 

"What," he says, flatly.

 

"I'm not an idiot, Snart. You said ‘ _Go against my instincts, for what I actually wanted.’_ That suggests you wanted something else. Maybe even _someone_?" She smirks at him as she prods.

 

Rather than answer, he stares at the wall, looks shifty, and pours an extra shot in passive-aggressive silence.

 

So Sara waits. She’s patient like that.

 

Sure enough, Snart eventually cracks. His voice is even _more_ drawling, now, if that’s possible. The alcohol adds to the effect. “I agreed to answer your question, so. _Maybe._ That’s my answer. Now, are we're done here? You're not actually my boss."

 

”Huh. Really didn’t expect you to be that honest."

 

“Well, consider it a one-time thing.”

 

A beat, and Sara pushes. “Not going to tell me who?”

 

He hunches a little, drawing inward on himself. “ _No._ Because it’s really not important. I have no idea why I even told you that."

 

She knows it’s not going to go anywhere, so she stops. “Fine. So let’s get drunk instead. Okay, _drunker._ We’ll play cards, I’ll tell you about the time the Queen of France seduced me, and I _promise_ not to ask you any more uncomfortable questions about your like-life.”

 

He makes a show of contemplating it, then half-smiles. “ _Let’s_.”

 

They drink. Snart lets her talk about the Queen of France. She nearly cries about Laurel again, but manages to avoid that, by getting him to talk about his own sister. She makes Snart promise to introduce them, someday. He makes her promise not to flirt too hard. They discuss the fact that _aliens_ apparently exist. Snart thinks aliens are trippier than time-travel. Sara is pretty sure they’re not.

 

“Do you still feel that way?" She eventually blurts out, because her self-control sucks, and because she’s a dirty rotten liar. “About… Your ’ _Maybe_ ’?”

 

His face snaps up, exasperated. No, not exasperated. Sad? “Doesn’t really matter, does it?”

 

"Of course it does. You know why? Because for once, Snart, our lives belong to _ourselves_. Sure. It sucks. Sure, it’s a lot of work, keeping time intact after you blew everything up. But you did it. You gave us our timelines, our lives, our choices. That was _your_ sacrifice, so you might as well have the reward, too. Right now, nobody's making you feel anything. If you still feel it, whatever it was, for whoever it was? Congratulations. That makes it real."

 

“Sure. Thing is, if my choices are my own, that makes the consequences mine, too. And any mistakes I make, so forgive me if I’m a little cautious about jumping into anything. But, trust me. It’s not happening, anyway.” He reaches his hand up, in an abortive gesture to touch at his eye.

 

The eye isn’t black anymore, thanks to Gideon. It had been on its way there, after Palmer had punched Snart in the face earlier. Right before his memories reset, when Snart had still thought of himself as some sort of vintage supervillain, and had made the mistake of mocking Raymond for trying to stop him.

 

Raymond.

 

Two and two abruptly make _four._

“ _Oh shit_.” Sara blurts out. It’s partly the vodka, partly the sheer unexpectedness of the moment.

 

“What?”

 

“See, at first I thought ‘Mick’, but…”

 

A splutter, and Snart nearly overbalances in his chair. _“_ Mick? _Mick?_ You thought I had _feelings_. Like that. For…”

 

Huh.

 

“You don’t, then?”

 

Snart grimaces. _“No_. Mick’s…a strange, terrible fixture in my life, for whatever the hell that’s worth. But no. Trust me, it is not like that. Ew. I feel weird just thinking about it.” He shakes his head. “ _Mick? Seriously?_ ”

 

And there’s her opening. " _Palmer_? _Seriously_?” She parrots.

 

Snart’s face closes off. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

She’s got him, now.

 

“You know. It explains a lot, actually. Your early odd, flirty antagonism. How you got weirdly…quieter, after Palmer & Kendra got all coupley? Or when they disappeared into time, and came back practically married. I thought it was because of everything going on with Mick, and maybe that’s partly true. But not the whole truth, is it?”

 

“ _Fuck you_.” Snart says, with the kind of venom that’s entirely about the fear of what you’re giving away by admitting something.

 

“I thought you just turned me down.” She quips, because she’s drunk and that sounds funny.

 

“Gross.” He says, resigned, and refills his shot glass. He doesn’t drink from it, though, just stares at the liquid, contemplative.

 

After a minute, he downs the shot.

 

Sara waits, a little while longer.

 

Finally, Snart speaks again. “It wasn’t planned, believe it or not. It just…started happening. I guess…” He takes a deep breath. “Probably around Russia, when he was stupid enough to try trading my life to Vostok. You know, I was _really mad_ at him for that?”

 

“Right. Because nothing says ‘I like you’, quite like almost leaving someone behind in a Russian gulag.”

 

“I wish I hadn’t told you that, either. And look. In my defense, I did plan on leaving him the suit. But it was a mistake, and one that I regret, alright? Here’s where the ‘I’m an idiot’ part comes back, isn’t it? I was doing what I always do. Tried to bury my feelings, _hard_. Even back then. I was trying to prove how much I didn’t care, and it didn’t even work. And then he went and fell for _Kendra_ , of all people. Which was probably the work of the Time Masters, anyway.”

 

Kendra. Ha. _Whoops._ Right. Because. Having feelings for Kendra was. In no way a relatable thing.

 

“You still picked him over Mick, though. When Mick told you to chose a side, with those first time pirates.”

 

He sighs, sadly. “I picked _the team_.”

 

“Yeah. But Palmer was the one with the puppy-dog eyes.”

 

“I guess. I just. I didn’t want to let myself think about it. So I didn’t, until it was too late. And yes. Whether that makes me an even bigger idiot than he is, or not, it’s a plan I intend to stick _with_ , so I’ll thank you to stop interfering.”

 

“Look. I’m not judging. Okay, okay. Only a little bit. Because Palmer can be a self-righteous, sanctimonious twerp sometimes. And he’s impulsive, and the biggest dork I know…”

 

“ _Not helping_.”

 

“But he’s also a good person. He cares about people.”

 

Snart closes his eyes. “Still not helping. He _is_ a good person. A better person than I am, by far, or that I have any interest in _being_. That’s _why_ I’m not touching the subject. I’m not making that mistake.”

 

Ouch.

 

She switches tone, tries a different tactic. “You know, he called you a hero, after you died?”

 

Snart’s face twists, something a bit sad in there, a little disheartened in its flare of hope, quickly quashed. “Hm. Guess he doesn’t know me so well, after all.”

 

“Funny you say that. Because the next thing he said was that ‘being a hero’ was the last thing you’d want to be remembered as.”

 

A shrug. But it’s too careful, too practiced.

 

Sara could shut up, but there’s a little too much vodka in her system, and not enough self-discipline, right now.

 

She keeps trying, anyway. “I mean it. If this is because you think you're going to screw Raymond up? Newsflash, it's a bit late for that."

 

"Thanks.”

 

“I'm serious. He watched his first fiancé die in front of him, and dedicated himself to building a supersuit to fight crime. He spent six months as a prisoner of Damian Darhk, and signed up to join a group of time travellers. He broke up with Kendra, then had _you_ go and die on him.” She reaches across the table, poking him in the shoulder. “And _then_ he joined up with Mick, and launched a revenge mission against Savage. That’s not even getting into all the other stuff he’s been through. Torture. Losing his suit. After which, he even tried carrying your Cold Gun. Then, he broke it, and had another existential crisis. Oooh! Almost forgot. Nearly _eaten by_ _dinosaurs._ Look, Snart. I can’t guarantee anything but like I said. He’s already plenty screwed up. How much worse could you be for the guy, anyway?”

 

“Shut up, or I’ll cut you off.” He says, dangling the bottle in front of them.

 

She raises her hands, placatingly “ _Fine_. But don’t say I didn’t try.”

 

He doesn’t say it, so she keeps trying.

 

“Look. It’s your life. Do what you want. I don’t exactly have a great track record on the subject of love. But…I’m not lying, Snart. He did miss you. It changed him, I think. You dying. I didn’t notice at first, but it did. He tracked down Mick, you know? After Rip dropped us in 2016. He said it was because you would’ve wanted someone watching Mick’s back. And then he got even more driven. Even more focused. Sadder, too. There was this one time, he wanted to talk to me about losing people, and I thought at first he was just trying to be nice, because of Laurel, but…”

 

“And then I got back, he punched me the face, and hasn’t spoken a word to me, since. Real caring welcome-back present. Fruit baskets are so passé, aren’t they?”

 

Sara just wants to get drunk, fight time pirates, and kiss girls. Leonard Snart's emotional problems really aren't her problem, just because she kissed him that one time.

 

Ugh. Having friends is the worst.

 

“Oh, shut up, Snart. Big whoop, Palmer might not like you back. It’s not like I haven’t been there. I mean. Fun fact. I actually really liked Kendra. _Really_ liked her,” she confesses.

 

“I’m sorry,” Snart says, and almost sounds like he means it.

 

“Yeah. But, Raymond. And Carter. And she said she was ‘probably straight’ that one time. So me too. Never really even let myself think about it. And now she’s gone, so I don’t even get the chance to try for that.”

 

Leonard snorts, and another thing occurs to Sara: “So if you weren’t into me, are you, like, gay, or? If you don’t wanna answer, that’s fine, too. No pressure. Judgment free drunk-zone.”

 

“I’m…particular about the people I like.” He says, slowly.

 

“I’m bi, I guess.” Sara says. “But I’m sort of done with men, lately. And yeah, okay. I have a type with girls.”

 

Snart looks at her, squinting. “Amaya too, huh?”

 

She gives a sideways nod, and taps the side of the bottle. “I’ll get there. But okaaaay. Awkward confessions over. Time for more drinking?”

 

He doesn’t disagree.

 

\--

 

Snart is a good drinking buddy, she decides, some vague span of time later. They switched to beer pretty quickly, but it’s still enough that, when they finally stumble out of there, staggering back to their quarters, they’re singing… a sea shanty, she thinks?

 

“ _WE’D FIRE NO GUNS. SHED NO TEARSSSS_ ….”

 

It made sense to be singing it, anyway. Up until they run smack dab into Palmer, his eyes bleary, like he’d just woken up. Snart falls over, and Sara starts giggling.

 

“I heard singing?” Palmer looks at them, and he looks. _Confused._

 

“Shhhh.” Sara says, in a stage-whisper. “We’re _a little drunk_.”

 

“Very drunk.” Snart clarifies, from the floor. “And you’re pretty,” he says, blinking up at Palmer.

 

“ _Oh._ I’ll uh.” Palmer makes as if to run, then wavers. “Do you need any help? Some water, maybe?”

 

“Dang Eagle Scout-ness. Always gotta be all help-y.” Sara slurs.

 

Snart flaps a hand. “M’fine.”

 

Palmer squint-frowns. _Jealous?_ Sara is pretty sure, anyway. She’s drunk, though. So who knows? Palmer could just be eye-exercising. That’s a thing. Is that a thing?

 

“Were you two…”

 

Sara taps Raymond on the chest, because it makes sense to, somehow, and leans in, conspiratorially. “Relax. Me and Snart? We’re basically bros. Except. You know. _I’m a lady_.”

 

“Except you did kiss me. Never letting you live it down.” Snart says, examining the ground, thoughtfully.

 

“You kissed him?” Palmer looks a little mad. Sara sees all these warning bells going off in his head. She thinks she sees him internally yelling things about ‘ _RESPONSIBLE ALCOHOL CONSUMINGS_ ” & “ _RESPECTING CONSENT WHEN INTOXIFICATED_.”

 

 _Intoxicated._ That’s the word.

 

“Not _today_.” Snart clarifies, mumbling into the floor. “It was like. Right before I died. Doesn’t even count. It was like ‘thanks for dying, bye now’. We didn’t _mean it_. Soooooo….” He trails off, moving his mouth a little bit, like he’s _sure_ there were more words. Somewhere.

 

“It was only because of the heterosexual butterflies.” Sara clarifies.

 

It doesn’t seem to clarify anything.

 

Palmer squints.

 

“Right! The butterfly effect. I changed fate. Cut my strings.” Leonard says, attempting to gesticulate and failing, wildly. “That must be why my arms feel floppy.”

 

Palmer sighs. “I was _going_ to just go back to bed, but we actually have a mission tomorrow, so. I should probably help the two of you.”

 

“You’re being nice. Ew.” Snart wrinkles the end of his nose. “You shouldn’t do that. It’s very confusing for me. Mixed signals.”

 

“I got myself covered. My bedroom is right there.” Sara says, pointing, and actually vaguely managing to point in the right direction. _Nice_. “I have water there. Plus, I’ve been poisoned, like, _a ton of times_. Hangovers are nothing.”

 

“Right.” Palmers blinks again, and somehow Snart has scooted forward, until his face is parallel with Raymond’s feet.

 

“My room is faarrrrrr awayyyyyy.” Snart whines, and reaches out to pat Raymond’s bunny slippers. Then, almost suspicious, he adds, “Raymond. Your feet are fuzzy.”

 

Raymond looks down at his feet, and at Snart. His expression wavers again.

 

“They’re nice.” Snart adds, philosophically.

 

Raymond’s eyes soften, and he nods at Sara. “I’ve got him from here.”

 

So she gives him an ironic salute, stumbles the rest of the way, and doesn’t look back at whatever Palmer and Snart are doing. They’ll handle themselves.

 

 

….

 

 

She slams on Snart's door, early that morning, planning to yell at him in revenge for letting her get drunk enough that the hangover _almost_ has an impact.

 

Instead, she gets a sleep-mussed Palmer, blearily looking at her. He is shirtless, and in pyjama pants. That have. Polar bears on them?

 

In Snart’s room.

 

"Hey?” He says.

 

She stands there a minute. Palmer stares back. She can’t help but grin, muttering, “Ha! _Damn, Snart._ ”

 

"What?" Another blink.

 

She gives Palmer a congratulatory finger-guns, and decides that, no, she’s not ready to engage with this new development. _Waffles._

When she gets to the galley, Snart is already there, nursing a coffee.

 

“ _So_. You said that you and Palmer was ‘never gonna happen’,” she says, going for more coffee.

 

Snart looks hungover, and faintly confused. “I thought you said we weren’t talking about any of that.”

 

She pours the cup of coffee, sets the waffles going, and sits.

 

A minute ticks by.

 

“Doesn’t mean I’m not going to wonder when I knock on your door and see Ray Palmer. _Shirtless._ Quite a sight, actually. I mean. I’m assuming he waited until you’d sobered up a little bit, because he’s an obnoxiously good person, so really. I should make a ‘congrats on the sex’ cake for you two, or something. Get _festive_.” Sara says, because she’s hungover and doesn’t actually give a fuck.

 

Snart looks up, and then over her shoulder, and she sees his expression shift from confused, to nauseous, to almost _scared_.

 

“And… he’s right behind me, isn’t he?” She says, cursing her timing.

 

He is, in fact. With a shirt this time, at least.

 

Just, standing there, and for a second she thinks he hadn’t heard, until the implications of what she said apparently hits him. ”Oh! You thought...." He points between the two of them, waving his fingers back and forth like a ridiculous dowsing rod, and “With the…” mimicking the finger guns.

 

“You didn’t?” She asks. Darn. It had totally made sense a minute ago.

 

“No!" Palmer says, a strange squeak, of nervousness.

 

"Right. Hilarious. What a wacky misunderstanding." Snart snarls. This is going. _Well._

 

Raymond looks like a kicked puppy. “Of course! Leonard, I’d never even _think_ about…”

 

"Yeah, I got that." Slamming his mug down on the table, Leonard stands. "Bye."

 

Just like that, he shoves himself out of the room, bumping Palmer aside as he goes.

 

Sara takes a sip of coffee as Ray keeps standing there, poleaxed. "Well. That went from cute to fucked in 60 seconds or less."

 

"Um." He sits down, in the exact same spot that Leonard had, falling into the seat like a metric-tonne of very confused bricks. "What. Um. Exactly just happened?"

 

“Recap. You were in his room. Half-naked, after I left you two alone last night. I made certain assumptions. Not unreasonably, mind. You denied it, vehemently. And… I think Leonard got offended.”

 

“What the hell, Sara? He was _incredibly drunk_! And _really clingy_. It’s not actually easy to walk down an entire hallway with someone hugging your leg, okay? I put him to bed in my room, because it was closer, and then I fell asleep in his.” Raymond shoves his hand through his hair, ruffling it forward, “I’d never take advantage of someone like that. Never. _That’s_ what I meant, when I said…not that I’d never think of _h_ …”

 

He trails off, and forget ‘kicked puppy’. This is full on ‘sad music cued, animal charity commercial’ levels. “But. I mean. Why would that bother him? If anything, I thought he’d… I don’t know. Laugh, at the idea of him having... Of him even wanting…Of _me_ …”

 

God. She really wants to meddle, because this is too much. She does. But she’s a good friend, to Snart, at least. And drunk pinky-swears-to-secrecy definitely happened at one point, last night. So Sara just fixes the wall with a flat stare. "I'm not going there."

 

“What? Going where?"

 

_"Nope."_

She’d going to start making a running tally of every time Raymond blinks like that, to see how many times his genius-level brain totally short-circuits.

 

Sara buries her face in the coffee mug, and heaves a groan. She’s. Not getting involved. She’s going to drink coffee. And eat her waffles. And get over this hangover. And then go out on the mission and defeat the… What was it today, anyway? Oh yeah. Animatronic gryphons poised to start running amok in the Ottoman Empire. Good times.

 

She’s definitely not meddling, even if she goes and says something like, “You know, you really are the dumbest genius that I know. And I’m counting Stein in that one.”

 

Ray reflexively takes a sip of the coffee mug in front of him, and makes a face. Yeah. Snart puts a ton of sugar in his coffee, doesn’t he? But drinks it black, so no one will notice. Wow. He needs to get a life.

 

She needs to get a life.

 

Raymond makes another face, all vulnerable and stuff. “Dumb? Probably. ‘ _What even are people and how am I supposed to react or understand what they are saying or feeling and what I’m supposed to do about it_?’” He does a cheery wave, all false-bravado irony. “Autistic here. So yes. I’ve got my moments, I will admit that. Like this moment. _Right now._ Really thinking I’m not actually understanding this conversation. Or the preceding one. Or, really anything that happened last night.”

 

Dang. She totally called that one. Probably. It’s not like it was a tough guess. Ugh. She really just wants all this emotional stuff to go away long enough for her to have breakfast, and _then_ maybe she can deal with her _own_ problems.

 

“Huh. Well. Um. Thanks for trusting me with that information. I’ll keep it in mind. _Do we have maple syrup?_ ”

 

Raymond frowns. “Yes? I think we do? But, okay, but last night. I mean. He was drunk. And…he called me pretty. Again. But. When he calls me pretty, and stuff. He doesn’t actually. I mean. It’s _Leonard_. He says that kind of stuff to everyone. Or. Kind of. I mean. It’s a little different, maybe. Okay. It was…uh, I guess mostly just with me. Sometimes. But. It’s not like he even _likes me as a person_!”

 

“Mhm. He say anything else?” Sara asks. Her waffles are almost done. Then she can flee.

 

“He was… huggy? And he said something about how his gun was really cool. And that I was cooler than he thought. And that…he was glad I had the gun, while he was gone. Because he trusted me with it, even if I broke it. And. That…he missed me? Which didn’t make any sense, because he was _dead_ , or didn’t actually have any memories of me. ”

 

Damn.

 

“Sara. Why aren’t you saying anything. Sara. _Sara._ ” Raymond takes another swallow of the coffee. “How does Leonard handle this much sugar in his coffee? _Why am I having this conversation_. Why does it feel like your deliberate silence is some kind of nonverbal cue that I’m missing.”

 

“So. He _missed_ you?” It’s not meddling if she just. Repeats what Raymond said, right? She promised she _wouldn’t tell Raymond_. But it’s not telling if he figures it out himself. Technically.

 

Snart is gonna kill her.

 

“Yeah, he said that, but…” Cogs turn. Very. Very slowly. “But that doesn’t mean that. I mean. Just because I…”

 

Sara just wants to punch time pirates and eat waffles and kiss girls. This should not be her life. Why. Why is this happening. She’s the worst at feelings. She is going to punch so many gryphons today. And it’s going to be awesome.

 

“Do you have feelings for him?” Sara says, because she is past the point of fucks.

 

Palmer, mid-swallow, coughs, and spits into his/Leonard’s coffee. “No? No. I don’t. I don’t have. I mean. Just because. When he died, I…and then later. But. But. I mean. I missed him. And…” Softness creeps into his voice. “I wish I’d gotten to know him better. That we’d had more time. I wondered every day if fate hadn’t pushed me in one direction, that I wouldn’t have…and I wanted a second chance. To have…because I never get one, not with anyone.”

 

He gives a strangled noise, and a strange sort of panicked serenity slides across his face. “I have to go? Do something?”

 

There’s a faint popping noise, as her waffles drop onto the plate. She looks at them, mournfully, and then gives up, and follows Palmer. _Quietly._ Because she is nosy as all hell, and a terrible friend, honestly.

 

She is very sneaky, and very quiet, and just around the bend of the hallway, as she hears Palmer knock on the doorway to Snart’s quarters.

 

“Get out of my doorway, Raymond.”

 

“If you want me to, I will. Just. One question, first.”

 

_Oooh, this is gonna be good._

 

“ _Fine._ ”

 

“Have you brushed your teeth, yet?”

 

“Yes?” It’s hesitant, less angry by sheer virtue of befuddlement replacing the stronger emotion.

 

“Good.” He says, firmly, and Sara hears Palmer takes another step forward, more into Snart’s personal space.

 

Snart half-way lurches back, then stops. “Why?”

 

“Because. I’d kinda like to kiss you.”

 

“ _Why?_ ” Snart repeats, a different cast to it, this time. Wonder, she might almost say.

 

“Because I want to. Because, unlike last night, you’re sober. Because I’m an idiot.” It’s light-hearted, with a desperate edge hiccupping through. “Also, because you’re _alive_. Which means, for once in my life, I actually get a second chance with someone. And I _really_ don’t want to go squandering that.”

 

“Hm. I guess that’s _fair_.” Comes Snart’s voice, a little cracked with emotion, followed by a muffled noise, that Sarah took as her cue to sneak off.

 

If she had been able to see, and wasn’t, instead, creeping back towards the galley, to give them the vaguest semblance of privacy?

 

She might have seen Raymond’s hand, brushing Snart’s cheek, tracing the side of it. Snart making a small noise as he grabbed Raymond by the collar, pulling in him for a very thorough kiss. She might have seen Raymond breaking off from the kiss, to catch his breath, to look at Snart, wide-eyed and awed. Or, him stumbling forward into Snart’s room, and letting the door slide shut behind him.

 

But she didn’t see any of those things. Because she was a good, respectful friend. Who had breakfast to eat. The most important meal of the day.

 

Instead, she goes back to the galley, where Amaya had just shown up, and stolen her damn waffles. And Sara just smiles, and makes a _second_ batch of waffles, and sits there, eating them, thinking about how distractingly pretty Amaya is, not the fact that her teammates are making out with each other.

 

Because all else aside? She’s here to eat waffles, punch things, and kiss girls. And she definitely is not going to let anyone else stop her from doing those things.

 

So…

 

If what she wants to do is eat waffles, punch things, and kiss girls?  
  
Then that’s exactly how her day is going to go. In that order, with no further interruptions to her glorious life-goals.

 

Because she’s Sara _freaking_ Lance, and she is just that awesome.

**Author's Note:**

> (I'm @DubiousCA on twitter, dubiousculturalartifact on tumblr, and I absolutely love comments, if you feel like it. :)


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